Dollar rises after Federal Reserve policy statement
The U.S. dollar rose on Wednesday after the U.S. Federal Reserve said it would end its pandemic-era bond purchases in March and paved the way for three quarter-percentage-point interest rate increases in 2022.
The dollar index was up 0.2% for the day to 96.737 shortly after the announcement.
Fed officials also forecast that inflation would run at 2.6% next year, compared to the 2.2% projected as of September.
The move in the index against major currencies came at the expense of the euro, the Japanese yen and British pound, among others.
Before the announcement, the dollar had been trading in a narrowly through the day and close to its highest levels in more than a year.
The greenback has been bolstered by expectations that U.S. interest rates will rise faster than those in other countries. The Fed is moving more quickly than the European Central Bank, for example, to pull back monetary support for the economy in the face of the evolving coronavirus pandemic.
The ECB and the Bank of England hold policy meetings on Thursday.
The euro was down 0.1% against the dollar at $1.1241 at 2:11 p.m. Eastern (1911 GMT).
Versus the Japanese yen, the dollar was up 0.5% to 114.105.
Britain’s pound fell 0.2% to $1.3202.
